After many years of declining
numbers Israel's kibbutz movement is staging a revival,
with many potential members wanting to join the unique form of collective
living.

The total kibbutz population of about
143,000 is the highest in its 102-year history. More people are now joining
kibbutzim than leaving and the addition of working-age adults and young
children is helping to redress the balance of an ageing population.

Most
kibbutzim have implemented reforms so as to become commercially viable.
Privatization with differential incomes and home ownership has increased the
attractiveness to newcomers reluctant to commit to pure communal principles.

Increasing
numbers of families are attracted to kibbutz living by the quality of
education, environment, space and security. The kibbutz enterprises also
provide thousands of job opportunities.

Two members of Kibbutzim won the
ninth international competition " Eilat Red Sea " Underwater
photography - Mimi. They are Mark Fuller, who won the main category and first
prize of $ 10,000. Second place was photographer Uri Dotan who won $ 3,000 .

The competition has been called " the Olympics of the world underwater
photography - Days " is the brainchild of Israeli diving magazine " s
" and IDIVESo far the events of " Eilat Red Sea
" awards have been worth more than half a million dollars and this
yearthe total award came to $ 80,000.

Back
in 1952 Ben Gurion asked a dairy worker to get permission from his kibbutz to
take up the position of Deputy Director General of the Ministry of Defense. The
dairy worker was just 29 years old but Ben Gurion believed that he was
important for the country. The worker approached his kibbutz and a vote was
held at a general meeting whether or not to allow a kibbutz member to work
outside the kibbutz. That was the way the kibbutzim operated in those days. The
members of Alumot voted in favor and the dairy worker, Shimon Peres, was
granted leave to serve the country as Deputy Director General of Defense.
Shimon Peres was instrumental in building Israel's Defense industry including
its nuclear capacity. He also served in numerous ministerial posts including
that of Prime Minister. He is of course Israel's current President.

The
kibbutzim formed the backbone of the country before Israel gained independence
in 1948 and during the first few years after independence. There was an
established infrastructure in place because of the kibbutzim and many notable
persons from kibbutzim took part in the political and defense organizations as
the new state came into being. The kibbutzim were also the bread basket of
Israel providing a large percentage of the country's food needs. Kibbutz
enterprises diversified over the years and now cover almost every type of
business and account for about 8% of Israel's economy.

The
Israelis – Ayelet Zurer

Ayelet Zurer is securing her position as the most successful Israeli
actress in Hollywood. After starring alongside Tom Hanks and Ewan McGregor in Angels
& Demons, which earned $500 million across the world, 41-year-old Zurer
has filmed the leading female role in director Chris Eyre’sfilm A Year in Mooring, along with
Josh Lucas (A Beautiful Mind).

In 2003, she graduated from small supporting roles in
Israeli films and won the Ophir (the Israeli Oscar), for her starring role in
Savi Gavison’s Nina’s Tragedies. Zurer played the title role.

Zurer’s Hollywood breakthrough began in 2005 when she was
cast in Steven Speilberg’s Munich. In 2008, she appeared in the thriller
Vantage Point alongside Dennis Quaid and Sigourney Weaver. She also
appeared as a nurse in Paul Schrader’s Adam Resurrected, who gets
involved with a disturbed Holocaust survivor played by Jeff Goldblum, “She’s an
actress whose abilities are so soft and warm,” Schrader said of Zurer when the
film was screened at the Haifa Film Festival.

In 2009, The Independent Film Critics Association crowned
Zurer one of Hollywood’s most beautiful women, and ranked her ninth – after
Natalie Portman and Keira Knightley and before Scarlett Johansson and Nicole
Kidman.

Currently, Dimona is the
third largest city in the Negev, with the population of 40,000. Due to
projected rapid population growth in the Negev, the city is expected to triple
in size by 2025.

Dimona is home to Israel's American
Black Hebrew
community, governed by its founder and spiritual leader, Ben Ammi Ben-Israel. The Black Hebrews number
about 3000 in Dimona, with additional families in Arad, Mitzpe Ramon
and the Tiberias
area. Their official status in Israel was an ongoing issue for many years, but
in May 1990, the issue was resolved with the issuing of first B/1 visas, and a
year later, issuing of temporary residency. Status was extended to August 2003,
when the Israeli Ministry of Interior granted permanent residency.

In the early 1980s, textile
plants, such as Dimona Textiles Ltd., dominated the industrial landscape. Many
plants have since closed. Dimona Silica Industries Ltd. manufactures
precipitated silica and calcium carbonate fillers. About a third of the city's
population works in industrial workplaces (chemical plants near the Dead Sea
like the Dead Sea Works, high-tech
companies and textile
shops), and another third in the area of services. Due to the introduction of
new technologies, many workers have been made redundant in the recent years,
creating a total unemployment rate of about 10%. Dimona has taken part of Israel's solar transformation. The Rotem
Industrial Complex outside of the city has dozens of solar mirrors that focus
the sun's rays on a tower that in turn heats a water boiler to create steam,
turning a turbine to create electricity. Luz II, Ltd. plans to use the solar
array to test new technology for the three new solar plants to be built in
California for Pacific Gas and Electric Company.

Dimona is at an average
height of about 550–600 meters above sea level. It is in the Negev Desert,
therefore it has a desert climate with low humidity for most of the year and
little precipitation. Average annual precipitation is about 100 mm
(4 in), mostly during the winter.

Dimona is connected to the
national rail service which allows for mobility of people and transportation of
bulk materials to the ports. The main bus terminal is the Dimona Central Bus
Station, with lines to Beersheba, Tel Aviv, Eilat,
and nearby towns.

The kibbutz was founded in 1953 by graduates of Zionistyouth movements
and members of the Nahal.
Located on the edge of the Green Line separating Israel from the Palestinianheld
West Bank,
the kibbutz was completely isolated in the desert, the nearest Israeli village
several hours away via a dirt road. After the 1967 Six-Day War
, a road was paved from Jerusalem via Jericho and along the shore of the Dead Sea. This
essentially ended the kibbutz's isolation and opened the door to its
development. Today Kibbutz Ein Gedi is home to 650 persons, 240 of which are
actual kibbutz members.

Kibbutz Ein Gedi is primarily involved with
agriculture and tourism of the surrounding area and neighboring antiquities

Located on the
shores of the Dead Sea, on the edge of the Judean Desert, facing spectacular
views of high rising cliffs, valleys and rivers is the Ein Gedi Hotel. The
hotel offers several levels of accommodations suitable for every type of guest,
and hidden among the flowers of the botanical garden is a special experience of
a pastoral retreat at the lowest plane of land on Earth.

Ein Gedi is a
desert oasis characterized by ample beauty which challenges the barren desert
and the salty sea. The people of Ein Gedi took a courageous step in building
the unique botanical garden, which brings together plants from all over the
world and provides those who stroll through its paths an experience of
tranquility, serenity and beauty.

The Israel Defense Force sent a humanitarian
mission to assist victims of the Typhoon in the Philippines, army sources said.

The mission, headed by Col. Ramtin Sabati, who commands the National Rescue
Unit, consists of 50 medical staff and a field hospital. The decision came
following an evaluation meeting held by IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Benny Gantz.

The mission will also include Col. Dr. Dudu Dagan, Deputy Chief Medical Corp
Officer, who will act as commander of the field hospital.

Medical professionals were also sent to
Tacloban City in the storm-ravaged Philippines.

The Foreign Ministry also announced that Israel would send a search and rescue
team with experience in searching damaged buildings, as well as further medical
teams.

Philippine officials have been overwhelmed by the scale of Typhoon Haiyan, one
of the strongest on record, which tore a path through islands in the central
Philippines on Friday.

About 660,000 people have been displaced and many have no access to food, water
or medicine, the United Nations said. The typhoon killed an estimated 10,000
people in one city alone, with fears the toll could rise sharply as rescuers
reach more devastated towns.

The Israeli army field hospital is the only
hospital in the area where the Israel Air Force transport plane carrying the
hospital and staff landed. All other hospitals in the area were totally
destroyed.

An air survey of the damage revealed that a
plane could not land without some repairs to one partially damaged air strip
and the only air strip that could be repaired.

Army engineers were parachuted into the area
with some equipment for making repairs
so as to ensure that the airstrip would be ready for the landing.

Within hours the hospital was up and running and
the operating rooms began performing some major operations conducted by Israel
Army surgeons. The wards were full of injured people receiving treatment from
the field hospital's medical staff. The maternity ward was also very busy as
several injured women gave birth on the first day.

Some 600,000 children living in Israel today have witnessed domestic
violence in their home, a report says.
The WIZO report also stated that about 200,000 women victims of domestic
violence reside in the country today.

Prof. Einat Peled of Tel Aviv University’s School of Social Work said that children exposed to violence in the home
have been statistically proven to be more likely to lack stability and
experience emotional difficulties than other children.

“When you consider the children who are exposed to violence, we know that in
the worst cases, the child lives in an environment of terror, fear and lack of
confidence,” she explained. “Secondly, there could also be developmental issues
in the fact the child is exposed to problematic models for interpersonal
communication and problem solving.”

“Watching abuse take place can affect the relationship between the child and
his parents,” Peled added.

“His relationship with an abusive father is problematic because of the
violence, and his relationship with a mother who isn’t able to defend herself
is also a problem because the child may see her as weak.”

Peled stressed, however, that these consequences vary and are more or less
severe depending on the degree and frequency of the violence occurring in the
home.

The WIZO study, which is based on data collected by welfare departments and law
enforcement authorities, also revealed that in the past year, some 7,335 women,
1,021 children and 2,860 men were treated in 89 centers for the treatment and
prevention of domestic violence across the country.

In total, about 15,000 inquiries were made to such centers this year.

Moreover, some 621 women and 1,047 children received assistance in 14 shelters
for battered women this year.

According to the data, every year about 60 women who begin the process of
integrating into a shelter do not stay.

The WIZO figures also showed that 17,444 cases of violence within the family
were opened by police in 2013.

Out of the cases, about 11,303 had originated from complaints of violence
against women. Another 657 of them were opened as a result of violations of
restraining orders. The total number of such orders filed this year is 7,183.

By the end of the current year, the number of cases opened by police is
expected to reach 20,000 and complaints of violence against women are estimated
to rise to 13,000, according to the report.

Moreover, 19 women were murdered by their partner or a family member since
November 2012 until today. In the past decade, a total of 186 women were
murdered by family members.

In terms of battered women’s ability to function on a daily basis, Peled said that
although abuse is a strain on women’s everyday lives, some women are still able
to assume their roles as mothers and working women.

In terms of medical treatment, about 4,170 women were treated in various
healthcare services for injuries following domestic violence and sexual assault
in 2012, the report showed. An additional 536 women who suffered such injuries
refused to be treated.

“Some women don’t even ask for help,” Peled said. “In these cases we need to
think of how we can make these services more accessible to them, and by
accessible I mean to adapt the range of services to different cultures and
different languages, for example. The aid needs to be adapted to women in
different situations.”

She added that although great efforts on the subject have already been made in
Israel, “we still have a way to go.

According to the proposal, there will be one
chief rabbi who will be elected regardless of his country of origin. There are
currently two chief rabbis, an Ashkenazi and a Sephardi one.

“Israel
has one prime minister, one president, one Supreme Court president and one IDF
chief of staff; the time has come for us to only have one rabbi for one nation,”
Livni said. “The State of Israel should have one chief rabbi to unite all parts
of Israeli society and a rabbinate that will give services to all parts of the
Jewish people instead of maintaining a formal, old-fashioned separation.”

According to Bennett, this change is an
important step symbolizing national unity.

“The only question is why didn’t this happen
sooner,” Bennett stated. “Today, when Ashkenazi people marry Sephardi people
and Yemenites and any other origin, there is no reason for two chief rabbis.”

The intended bill would also separate the
rabbinate from the religious courts system, making it independent. The head of
the religious court and his deputy would be chosen by judges in the Great
Rabbinical Court, just as High Court justices choose their president.

The reasoning behind this change is that Livni,
Bennett and Ben-Dahan feel the head of the rabbinical courts should be able to
focus only on that job, as opposed to the current situation in which the chief
rabbis lead religious courts, even if they are not trained rabbinical judges.

If the bill becomes law, it will only apply after
the next chief rabbi election, in 10 years.

Rabbi Haim Navon, a popular author who teaches
at moderate religious-Zionist institutions, praised the proposal on Facebook,
writing “it’s about time.”

“Here’s a recommendation: The next chief rabbis
should be elected for only five years. Ten years is too long for only one
person to be in charge,” Navon added.

Rabbi Gilad Kariv, speaking for the Reform
Movement in Israel, called for the cancelation of the rabbinate.

“The State of Israel is not Iran and Judaism in
Israel and in the Diaspora don’t need a Vatican,” Kariv said. “In a reality in
which the Orthodox community doesn’t listen to the chief rabbis’ decisions
anyway, the job is just a symbol of the Orthodox monopoly and the undemocratic
and un-Zionist idea that there is only one right way to be Jewish.

Several car bombs have exploded in central
Israel in the past few months as the heads of Israel's Mafia battle for
control.

In addition during the past few years there have
been several gun battles in the center of Israeli cities as crime families
battle for control of areas of the country. Several people have been killed
including some innocent passers by.

The head of a major crime organization in
central Israel who has been a central figure in police investigations, was
immediately declared a suspect in a recent car bombing, as well as in the
murder a month earlier of two men associated with a rival crime family.

The Israel Police and the Judiciary have been
unable or unwilling to tackle Israel's Mafia problem.

In the wake of the upsurge in mob violence,
Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch (Likud Beytenu) has called for
“preventative arrests” against criminal figures along the lines of the
administrative detentions used to fight terror.

“Our intention is to take [criminals] off the street,” Aharonovitch said

at a conference of the Journalists Association
in Eilat.

“I need to worry about the citizens and not about them [the criminals]. This is
a war and we will win this war.”

It was a statement similar to one he made during an interview on Channel 2, in
which he said that “in a war you use all the tools. There are tools I have
requested – budget increases and to allow the police to use administrative detentions.”

An official at the Public Security Ministry said that Aharonovitch is in favor
of “preventative arrests... carried out before the commission of a crime, which
is permitted if it is for the sake of public security.”

The official added that “if people are going to describe these organizations as
being like terror groups, then they need to be treated like terror groups.”

Despite Aharonovitch’s statements, one government source said Tuesday that
administrative detention was “not being discussed.”

The source said that while many more aggressive measures were under discussion
following last Thursday’s attempted car bombing in Tel Aviv of a prosecutor
working on cases against organized crime, administrative detention was not one
of the measures.

Administrative detention is indefinite detention without formal trial or even
regular charges, although military judges can approve specific periods of
detention.

The government says it is used in rare circumstances for foreign terrorists,
such as Hamas members, to prevent them from committing future crimes or where
presenting evidence at a trial would expose intelligence sources in the field.

Administrative detention is highly controversial and rarely used in Western
democracies, with Israel and the US being among those nations employing it.

It has never been used to fight domestic crimes, which must be brought to
trial, the suspects being detained only for defined periods by civilian courts.

The opening of the first privately owned power
plant in the country heralds the expansion of private electricity production
that will mean lower prices for consumers, Water and Energy Minister Silvan
Shalom said.

Shalom spoke at the opening ceremony for OPC-Rotem, a natural-gas plant in the
Negev Desert about a dozen kilometers east of Dimona. While the 440-megawatt
facility came online over the summer, officials held the plant’s formal opening
ceremony at the desert facility.

Shalom said with the expansion of private companies, a streamlining of
government involvement and the use of natural gas, consumers will see lower
bills on common utilities.

“Power generation will become much cheaper,” he told an audience of
journalists, diplomats and industry executives.

“Therefore, the rates will go down dramatically in the next few years by dozens
of percentage points, and each of you will feel it in your households.”

Shalom said he wants 40 percent of electricity generation to be private.

“You’ll pay less for electricity, less for gas, less for water,” he said,
noting how electricity costs impact the distribution of the other commodities.

Shalom praised the coordination between the government owned Israel Electric
Corporation and the OPC-Rotem power plant; IEC officials trained their counterparts
at OPC-Rotem.

But, he said, “we’re heading toward a huge reform in the electric market. We
would like to streamline the IEC and streamlining means downsizing employees.”

Construction on the power plant, which processes gas piped in from the Mediterranean
Sea, started in 2011 and took only 30 months to complete, which was nine months
ahead of schedule. But the smooth construction process belied the strenuous
process of approval.

Around 1,000 Negev residents were among the staff hired to build the power
plant.

A spokesperson said, “The establishment of the power plant here will enable not
just clean, environmentally friendly energy, but mainly to encourage the
creation of new jobs in the Eastern Negev.”

OPC-Rotem is part of the electricity arm of IC-Power, a subsidiary of the
Israel Corporation established in 2007. In total, IC-Power generates more than
4,000 megawatts of power in several countries in Latin America as well as in
Israel.

Although OPC-Rotem was the first private power station to come online in
Israel, it is now not the only one operating.

Three weeks after the connection of OPC-Rotem in July, several turbines at the
Dorad gas power station in Ashkelon were activated. That station is slated to
operate at its full, 840- MW capacity by the end of the year. Both OPC-Rotem
and Dorad had rushed to connect to the grid this summer at the behest of the
IEC, which had feared an otherwise jeopardized power reserve during the year’s
hottest months.

By the end of summer in 2015, an even larger independent power station, the
870-MW Dalia Power Energies gas facility in the Shfela region, will also come
online and will sell the largest amount of electricity to the IEC.

Funds from selling public housing will be used
to aid the needy, in rent payment and to buy more property for affordable
housing, according to an amendment to the Public Housing Law approved by the
Ministerial Committee for Legislation.

The same panel voted down the bill in August and Justice Minister Tzipi Livni
and ministers from Yisrael Beytenu continued to oppose the legislation this
week. The bill will have to pass three votes in the Knesset before being
implemented.

Under the current law, people who resided in public housing for extended
periods have the option of buying the apartment.

The amendment proposed by Finance Minister Yair Lapid and Housing and
Construction Minister Uri Ariel requires that money from such sales be used to
invest in more public housing and its maintenance, to keep the public housing
supply intact and to subsidize rent for those eligible to receive aid.

Much of the funding is expected to go to the second option, aid in rent, which
Lapid and Ariel prefer.

“Today, we started off on a path that will give solutions to public housing and
realistic aid in paying rent for those who are eligible,” Ariel stated. “After
many years, tenants will finally be able to buy property that they will own and
be fully responsible for, and improve their social and economic standing.”

According to Ariel, selling public housing apartments will give its residents
independence.

The New Israel Fund Initiative for Social Change, or Shatil, opposed the
amendment and demanded that all funds from selling public housing be put into purchasing
or building new public housing and not invested anywhere else. In addition, the
organization said the government should funnel additional funds toward that
end.

The French and Israeli governments will examine signing an
agreement to allow French companies to build two additional light rail lines in
Tel Aviv at a cost of NIS 30 billion. One line, the Green Line, will run
between Herzliya and Holon, at an estimated cost of NIS 17 billion, and the
second line, the Purple Line, will run from Kiryat Ono via Tel Hashomer, to Tel
Aviv, at a cost of NIS 13 billion.

Parties involved in the talks said that if a franchise to
build the lines is given to a French consortium, the Green Line could be
completed before the Red Line, which is under construction. The deadline for
the Red Line has again been pushed back from 2017 to 2022-23, due to
bureaucratic and regulatory difficulties and problems.

Minister of Transport Yisrael Katz met French Junior
Minister of Transport Frederic Cuvillier, "The French government is
interested in being involved in building the Tel Aviv-Gush Dan light rail and
metro network. I'll listen to the proposal with the management of NTA, which is
responsible for the project, and we'll consider the legal aspects.

Katz said that the French want to participate in the
construction, financing, and operation of the light rail lines. "They have
extensive and critical experience. Obviously, we'll insist that most of the
workers be Israelis," he added.

Katz said that the government would also consider awarding
the French franchisee two additional lines (the Yellow Line and the Blue Line),
but emphasized that NTA would be a key partner in the project.

Shahal, who is close to the French government, said,
"The idea of the Tel Aviv light railway is one of several ideas for
economic cooperation in infrastructures between Israel and France. This is a
respectable, European-scale project and a French consortium could build it much
faster than planned and at competitive terms."

A government-to-government agreement could open the taps,
provided that the contract terms do not deviate from market norms.